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ACC basketball: Boston College season wrap (Things were bad, and might not get better all that soon)

Ryan Anderson, Robert Carter, Jr.

Boston College forward Ryan Anderson announced this week he will transfer after starting the last three years for the Eagles. Boston College went 8-24 this season, prompting the firing of coach Steve Donahue.
(AP Photo | Gerry Broome)

Putting a bow on the ACC basketball season, from worst to first. Up next is Boston College, which wrapped up the title of most disappointing team in the conference by Christmas.

Record: 8-24 (4-14 ACC)

Last seen: Losing to Georgia Tech in overtime on the first day of the conference tournament, a setback that tied the Eagles with 2011 Wake Forest for the most total losses in a season by an ACC team.

What went right: Boston College will always be able to claim a victory over the nation's top-ranked team, even if it was against a then-unbeaten Syracuse team just at the start of a 10-game shooting slump that left it looking like anything but the No. 1 team in the country. But aside from that 62-59 overtime victory on Feb. 19, there wasn't much to take from this season.

What went wrong: The Eagles lost their first three games and would never get closer to .500 than 3-4 the rest of the way against a schedule that didn't offer many places to hide. They played alarmingly bad defense, a deficiency that never sorted itself out for more than a game at a time. Despite a multitude of options for its rotation, very few players offered any sort of consistency.

Considering Boston College began the season with seemingly credible hopes of an NCAA tournament bid, it was an unmitigated disaster. Playing all but two games without center Dennis Clifford didn't help, but even the presence of a 7-footer to patrol the paint wouldn't have made enough of a difference to salvage something from this season.

Who's leaving: Reports surfaced shortly after Boston College's season ended that coach Steve Donahue would return for a fifth season. Less than a week later, he was fired. Forward Ryan Anderson plans to transfer, and rising junior guard Olivier Hanlan could still make a leap to the NBA. Anderson and Hanlan were the only players to average double figures for the Eagles this season.

What will be new: Boston College athletic director Brad Bates, formerly of Miami (Ohio), dipped into his experience in the Mid-American Conference and plucked Jim Christian away from Ohio. It wasn't a brand-name hire, but Christian's teams have been good more often than not (except when he was at Texas Christian, whose basketball teams are not good more often than not).

Christian is likely to have a senior-heavy team to begin his tenure, and while there could still be more attrition, a roster overhaul seems more likely heading into 2015-16 than next season.

Program trajectory: Even. Anderson's gone and Hanlan could be as well, and without them it becomes difficult to envision the Eagles having a functional enough offense to thrive even if Christian somehow gets them to play respectable (if not stout) defense.

If Boston College wins a dozen games and avoids the ACC cellar next season, it will probably constitute a decent year. But just how much will a fanbase that filled 8,606-seat Conte Forum to half capacity just four times in nine conference games show interest in a team with that sort of upside?

Christian shouldn't be expected to turn an eight-win team into a conference contender overnight. In the short term, Boston College's growth will not and probably should not be judged on wins and losses. That's hardly an easy sell at a school five years and counting removed from its last NCAA tournament appearance.